Haitian workers gassed over Hillary Clinton’s minimum wage mess

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Samuel Maxime

Editor-in-Chief

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (sentinel.ht) – It was with tear gas and water cannons that police cleared the latest protest of Haitian workers demanding wages respective of the law and cost of living. The scene which is likely to repeat and intensify, is the result of a plethora of actions taken by the Hillary Clinton State Department to keep Haitians suffering.

After years, former Haitian President Rene Preval (2006-2011) had signed a bill raising the minimum wage in Haiti to 300 HTG ($4.76) per day. WikiLeaks cables released during the time showed how viciously the State Department under Hillary fought the Preval administration’s efforts.

It would not be under Preval but under Haitian President Michel Martelly (2011-2016) that Clinton would be able to lower the minimum wage. Martelly was not elected president, he was hand-picked by the Clintons after finishing fourth in the first round of presidential elections.

According to the General Director of the 2010 Provisional Electoral Council (CEP), Pierre Louis Opont, it was during the year of the devastating January 12, 2010 earthquake, when Hillary Clinton held the U.S. State Department and Bill Clinton was the United Nations Envoy to Haiti, that Cheryl Mills, Hillary’s Chief of Staff at the State Department, and Kenneth Merten, U.S. Ambassador to Haiti (2008-2012), changed the results of the elections to allow Martelly to pass.

It would be under Michel Martelly that the Haitian National Palace would unilaterally, dismiss the law voted by the 49th Legislature and enacted by the former president, to lower the minimum wage lower than it had been in years.

Brooke Binkowski of Snopes.com looked to fact check the claims of Hillary Clinton’s State Department in Haiti and its efforts to keep Haitian wages low and, in the end, tried to give Clinton a pass.

Binkowski writes that the claim is true “but lacks context”. She points out as false that “Hillary Clinton was the sole architect of the move to reduce Haiti’s minimum wage.” She says that it was a “concerted effort on the part of Haitian elites, factory owners, free trade proponents, U.S. politicians, economists, and American companies…”

Where Binkowski is dangerously wrong is neglecting that as the Chief Diplomat of the United States of America, a Secretary of State, especially towards a country like Haiti, is extremely powerful. Especially when her husband has sole control of billions of earthquake reconstruction dollars. Especially when since their honeymoon, which was in Haiti, the duo has had a particular interest in Haiti, including a sweetheart deal on a gold mine landed by Hillary’s brother in early 2012.